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Postman’s Park’s Memorial to Heroic Self Sacrifice

Tucked away
in a quiet corner of Postman's Park in central London, easily
overlooked, lies a remarkable memorial. Under a wooden canopy, stands a
short stretch of brick wall upon which are affixed over fifty ceramic
plaques, each bearing the name of an ordinary person who performed a
final, extraordinary act of bravery and self-sacrifice in their life.
Some plaques bear two or more names. Altogether some sixty-two people
are commemorated here. All of them died while trying to save the lives
of others.
The Memorial to Heroic Self-Sacrifice was created by
artist George Frederic Watts, who put forward the idea for a memorial in
a letter to The Times in 1887 to mark Queen Victoria's golden
jubilee. Watts had been colleting stories of heroic sacrifice from
newspaper clippings for many years. One story that struck a special
chord was that of Alice Ayres, a servant who saved the lives of her
employer’s three children by throwing a mattress out of the window to
cushion the fall and dropping them to safety. Alice herself was overcome
by fumes and stumbled out of the window to her death.

The
character of a nation as a people of great deeds is one, it appears to
me, that should not be lost sight of. It must surely be a matter of
regret when names worthy to be remembered and stories stimulating and
instructive are allowed to be forgotten.
It is not too much to say
that the history of Her Majesty's reign would gain a lustre were the
nation to erect a monument, say, here in London, to record the names of
these likely to be forgotten heroes. I cannot but believe a general
response would be made to such a suggestion, and intelligent
consideration and artistic power might combine to make London richer by a
work that is beautiful, and our nation richer by a record that is
infinitely honourable.

Sadly, nobody paid attention
to this beautiful idea. So Watts decided to fund the memorial himself.
Ten years later, he was able to raise £3,000 for its construction —he
himself bore £700 (about £71,000 as of 2017). The memorial opened in
1900 with just four plaques, with a further nine tablets added during
Watts's lifetime. After his death in 1904, Watts's wife, Mary Watts,
took over the management of the project. But as Mary became more and
more preoccupied with the management of the Watts Gallery and Watts
Mortuary Chapel in Compton, Surrey, she began to lose interest in the
project. Work ceased altogether in 1931 with only 53 of the planned 120
tiles in place.
The memorial came into public notice in 2004 when it appeared in the movie Closer,
where the memorial was used as a key element in the movie’s plot. Three
years later, Leigh Pitt, a print technician from Surrey, died rescuing a
nine-year-old boy drowning in a canal. Following his death, his
colleague, Jane Michele, approached the Diocese of London to suggest a
new addition to the memorial, in the name of Leigh. Despite opposition
from the Watts Gallery to proposals that the memorial be completed, a
new plaque commemorating Pitt’s heroic actions was added on 11 June 2009
— 78 years after Mary Watts installed the last plaque.
The Memorial to Heroic Self-Sacrifice, today, remains an obscure destination drawing only a handful of visitors.
Photo credit: Sarflondondunc/Flickr
Photo credit: Jez Nicholson/Flickr
Photo credit: Jez Nicholson/Flickr
Photo credit: Paul Robertson/Flickr
Sources: Wikipedia / www.postmanspark.org.uk / Wikipedia
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